Tim Bateson

When I built my house I put a PVC pipe down before they poured the walk. With a couple elbows and screw-on caps at each end. Now I just spin off the caps and run my wires under the walk. FYI use a big pipe. I went with 3" & still not big enough.

Yes, I tried both online & downloaded converters. Yes this runs off an SD card or USB drive.

They are MP4 files. My Virtual Santa are MPG files. I've tried three different programs, and none of them produce anything either of my projectors will recognize.

I've used a Virtual Santa for years. So this year I bought a bunch of spooky stuff from AtmosFX . Big mistake. Nowhere on their website do they warn you that their products ONLY work with the latest (expensive) projectors. I've had no luck converting them. Even AtmosFX hasn't successfully converted their own products to work with older projectors. Anyone here found a good conversion for these?

I rearrange my display every year to make it different. I add elements & remove elements from year to year. Unless I customize each sequence every year, it just looks like flashing lights that are in rhythm with the music. I want my display to dance & sing with the music, not just flash to the beat. That's why I moved up from a Mr Christmas years ago. No offense to those using them. Was a great way to start. I don't have every song perfectly synced the way I would want, but every year I tweak and modify every sequence, getting closer to that perfection every year.

In all of the years I've done this, I have yet to find a sequence, either purchased or shared that works out of the box with my display. I have had to either heavily modify or totally re-write every one of them.

When I used incandescent lights, my Buzz-Box was invaluable!!!! Gathering dust now. I do use the LED light keeper for my LEDs. FYI - I have found nothing that works well with LED Net lights.

Scot, you need to build one of these for Halloween...

I have (had) one neighbor that complained year after year. The rest love the show. I had stopped doing interviews, entering contests & advertising because of him. Trying to make peace with him, just didn't help. Last year he called the Sheriff. He was told that light displays were not illegal. Then he called our HOA. Funny thing is he "should" have known the HOA president has the 2nd largest light display in the neighborhood. Fast forward to this year... He has (finally) moved away, and our display - my wife & I dressed up as Mr & Mrs Clause will be featured on the cover of our HOA magazine (it's a BIG community). I think our traffic is going to get really heavy again!

I'm putting up my "Halloween" RGB lights on the house this weekend. Everything else starts on Nov 3rd.

I use the same PC, that I use for my business. Stuck an extra NIK card in it and haven't had any issues in the 3 seasons that I've been running it this way. I had used laptops in the garage for a few years & had nothing but issues with them. One Cat5 cable runs out into the garage to my LOR machines. Another Cat5 runs out to the garage to a dumb switch which has several Pixel controllers connected. The LOR boxes are a combination of hard wired Cat5 and wireless.

If you are thinking of moving to pixels anytime soon, you will need a workhorse of a computer to generate the show. Also skip the MP3 if you are going this route - can't handle it.

Dec 18-19 Christmas Decorations are 45% off Dec 20 – 24 Christmas decorations are 50% off

The weather has not been kind this year, so setting up & tweaking the show took so long, I just got around to making a video. Rather than a dozen videos, I opted for 1 video of the entire show (about 29min). I did edit out "Little Drummer Boy" due to file size. I was up too late last night & now see I didn't upload the final edited version. The last few songs are out of order, but enjoy and please comment - even critically - I may not like all of the comments, but if I blew something in a big way, I do want to fix it for next year. Embedding within my website wasn't working last night, or maybe I was too tired, So click on either of the first 2 pictures to go to the video www.liberty-laser.com/Christmas (note - I have now added color spot lights to the house - very lacking in this video) Our 2013 Play List voice-over - Opening 0:48 voice-over - Walter Cronkite 0:19 Amazing Grace - Techno 1:31 Little Drummer Boy - Bob Segar 3:29 voice-over - Going Green 0:32 Christmas with a Capital C - Fish 3:44 voice-over - Disclaimer 0:16 Carol of the Bells - Monique Danielle 2:24 Dominick Italian Christmas Donkey - Uncle Pepe 2:32 Coca Cola Theme 1:01 voice-over - Neighbors 0:33 The Meaning of Christmas - Linus(Peanuts) 3:27 Wizards of Winter - TSO 3:05 Let It Snow - Michael Buble' 2:04 voice-over - Web 0:49 Soldiers Silent Night 3:47 voice-over - Close 0:31

I use old C9 strings and pop the unused sockets off or seal with hot glue or caulk. I have strings done all 3 ways for several years now. However the CDI strobes will not be as bright after the 1st year. They don't loose much, but when set next to a new bulb there is an obvious difference.